Postal Service hurt by Congress

U.S. Mail bags are on display at the U.S. National Postal Museum. The popular museum, located opposite Union Station in Washington, was established through joint agreement between the United States Postal Service and the Smithsonian Institution and opened in 1993.

After reading the Oct. 21 letter to the editor about delivering mail every other day, I just had to respond. First, the Postal Service is not broke and it hasn't taken any of our tax money since 1971. What's really going on here is right-wing sabotage of the Postal Service. In 2006, the Bush White House and Congress whacked the post office with the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, an incredible piece of ugliness requiring the agency to pre-pay the health care benefits not only of the current employees but also of all employees who'll retire during the next 75 years. Worse, this ridiculous law demands that USPS fully fund this seven-decade burden by 2016. Imagine the shrieks of outrage if Congress tried to slap FedEx or other private firms with such an onerous requirement. This politically motivated mandate is costing the Postal Service $5.5 billion a year - money taken out of postage revenue that could be going to services. That's the real source of the "financial crisis" squeeze-ing America's post offices.

Due to a 40-year-old accounting error, the federal Office of Personnel Management has overcharged the post office by as much as $80 billion for payments into the Civil Service Retirement System. This means that, far from being a drain on the public treasury, USPS has had billions of its sales dollars erroneously diverted into the treasury.

Our do-nothing Congress should take immediate action to repeal the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act plus correct the 40-year-old accounting problem. Unfortunately, much of this Congress and the public in general doesn't know or remember the Post Office Department was considered such an important function of public affairs that it was explicitly authorized by the Constitution. The Founders would've laughed their wigs off had anyone proposed that the existence of such an essential civic agency be dependent on its profitability.

Jerry T. Payne

Fishers

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Postal Service hurt by Congress

After reading the Oct. 21 letter to the editor about delivering mail every other day, I just had to respond. First, the Postal Service is not broke and it hasn't taken any of our tax money since 1971.